Jogging Gorgeous Summer
by MSVLR
Summary: Aang & Co. break for a trip to the beach, set between Bitter Work and The Fury of Aang. All feedback would be appreciated, critical or otherwise, as this is my first fanfic.
1. Chapter 1

**Jogging Gorgeous Summer**

Sokka frowned at the misshapen oyster shell as if it were deformed out of pique. He was getting better at carving, though. This one would probably succeed in looking like a fish. Eventually. Maybe. Beside him, Toph stretched, leaning back against the packs in the spot she had claimed between the watertribe siblings. She laced her fingers behind her head, face pointed to the warmth of the sun. "So, what's the next step on the 'save the world' quest?"

Sokka made another notch for a scale, not bothering to look up. "We're headed to Ba Sing Se."

"You know…" Katara turned from her sight-gazing to look at her brother. "I don't think we need to, really. We were going there to find Aang an earthbending teacher, and now we have Toph. As long as Aang keeps learning and we can dodge those crazy girls, I don't think it matters where we go."

"To the beach!" The trio turned toward Aang at the triumphant cry. "…what? It's perfect. All that water and san- earth. Where better to learn both bending styles? C'mon, Appa!"

"Not exactly what I meant-" Everyone lurched to the side as Appa bellowed affirmatively and changed course. Katara picked herself off Toph and smoothly continued, "But I guess it'll work."

---

"Where is the kettle?" The Dragon of the West looked mournfully at the dissembled camp, bereft of his usual morning cup of tea.

"Packed with everything else." Zuko slung the last pack onto the hostrich and snagged the reigns, leading it over to his uncle. "We need to move. Azula could come back, and you're healed enough to travel. We can rest if you get tired, and you can teach me along the way."

"She's not a morning person. We could have a cup of tea before we go." At Zuko's long-suffering look, Iroh sighed and mounted obediently. "Where are we headed?"

Zuko gripped the hostrich's reigns under its chin and led it out of the ghost town. Remembering his uncle's advice on humility, he kept silent until he thought he could speak without bitterness. "Where else? After the Avatar: we're following him because Azula will, and it's her I'm after now." He'd have to work harder on being less bitter. Just like everything else.

---

Sokka stretched out next to Appa and followed the flying bison's lead, napping on the warm sand just above the tide line. Aang sidled up next to him and leaned in, hovering over his face. When that brought no reaction, he safely went to work, burying his victim from the neck down.

A couple yards away, Katara was hip-deep in the waves, practicing a new waterbending technique: making water sculptures, not of fountains, but people and specific objects. Aang's trick with the octopus form had started it, and now she practiced whenever no one would see it. And would continue to do so until the images stopped changing-

Katara took a deep breath and started again, pulling water from the waves to hover above them. Her wrist flicked, and the sphere elongated, taking on the shape of a platypus bear rearing up, beak agape in silent roar. She smiled in satisfaction, and with that small break in concentration, the form began to change. Open beak became open lips, a raised paw an inviting hand as the fur on his head fluctuated between a high ponytail and short hair. She threw her hands up in disgust and turned as the water collapsed, then trudged up the shore.

"What're you doing?" Toph lounged nearby, head propped up on one hand.

"Practicing." Katara wished she could flash warning looks Toph's way, but the icy tone conveyed 'drop it' pretty effectively on its own. Not that it mattered, since Toph wouldn't hesitate to ignore the message.

"No, I mean right now. What's that thing you're always messing with?" A column of sand pushed Toph to her feet and she padded over, staying just outside the surf.

"Oh, a betrothal necklace. It was my grandmother's, my mom's, and now mine." Katara dropped her hand from tracing the carving.

"Betrothal, eh? In the Earth Kingdom, the groom bends or builds his bride a new home, then carries her across the threshold the day they're- hey, Twinkletoes. You need to work on your sneaking."

"Who's sneaking? I'm just – uh, bending a sandcastle! Building. I meant building." At the girls' bemused expressions, Aang flushed and hastily piled a large mound of sand in front of him. He began sculpting it with air, seeming to smooth away excess sand to reveal the Southern Air Temple in miniature underneath.

"That looks like fun." Katara gathered her own pile, snaked water over and formed it into a chisel. She smoothed and hollowed out a version of the Northern Water Tribe's meeting hall: the elaborately carved ziggurat complete with waterfall.

"Ooh, nice touch." Aang grinned as Katara stepped back to admire her handiwork.

"Think that's impressive? Watch this." Toph gestured and the sand in front of her surged up, shaping itself at the direction of her impatient movements. In moments, a small city was before her, down to flags on the high walls that surrounded it. Another gesture and they began rippling as if in a breeze.

"Wow, Toph –" Katara began, cut off by Aang's exclamation.

"Oh,_ man!_ Is that Ba Sing Se?"

"Yep." Toph crossed her arms in satisfaction. Katara frowned, then remembered the last fight she had with Toph and decided to take the high road.

Momo glided in and landed next to Katara's sandcastle, managing not to disturb the structure. He circled the building once, trilled approvingly, and then hunched down at the entrance. "Aww. Thanks for picking mine, Momo." On cue, the lemur burrowed into the edifice, and emerged with a hermit crab. "Argh!"

---

"What do I learn next?" Zuko's voice startled Iroh out of his light doze.

"Hm? Oh, yes." Iroh stretched in the saddle and looked down at his nephew speculatively. "There is a defensive technique you need to learn that requires great control. I think you would be a natural at it."

"What is it?" Zuko slowed, and brought the hostrich to a halt. He offered a hand which his uncle waved off as he slid off the mount with surprising grace.

"You can create a fast-moving sphere around yourself that can either incinerate or deflect anything that tries to come through. It is very difficult, mainly because it is most often used as a distraction while the firebender escapes. It's hard to concentrate on fleeing and firebending at once."

"That's what Azula did after– we hit it with all four elements, and but she vanished."

Iroh nodded. "The only element that could have made it through was earth. Air and fire would just feed the existing flame, and water would evaporate before getting through. Depending on how hot the flame was, the earth could turn to glass and become more dangerous."

"But the spinning would still deflect it, right?"

"Exactly. The rest I will tell you _after_ we have lunch."

---

Sokka jolted awake as a questing tongue entered his ear and sat up with a yelp – at least, he would have if he weren't buried in sand. The anteater-dog cocked its head and whuffed his face experimentally with its long nose. "Uh, guys? Little help here?" A slurp. "_Quickly?_"

Toph kicked and Sokka launched, showering Appa and the anteater-dog with sand. They shook it off with annoyance, and started inspecting one another. Sokka landed on the other side of the flying bison, catching himself in a crouch. "Hah! …It's so sad that I'm used to being catapulted."

"_This_ is what you were yelling about?" Katara raised an eyebrow at her brother, giving the creature a scratch behind the ears. "Seems harmless enough to me."

"Hey, last time I was trapped with something cute, the mother came along and tried to kill me."

"Oh? What was her name?"

Any retort was interrupted as the anteater-dog suddenly began making shrill grunt-barks and raced over a nearby dune. Sokka bent backwards and cracked his back, stiff. "Good riddance." A yelp and loud crunch rang out, followed by silence all along the beach.

Katara and Sokka exchanged wide-eyed looks. Toph crouched, hands and feet in the sand, and listened. Moments later she turned to the siblings, paler than usual. "I never thought I'd say it, but the last place I want to be is on the ground."

---

Orange and red flames swirled in once last flair and died out. Iroh squeezed Zuko's shoulder and nodded approvingly. "You've mastered the movement, and adding other fire to your own. You're a natural. I didn't learn nearly so fast."

"Really?" Zuko relaxed, and straightened his shoulders. Uncle Iroh's comments usually helped, but he felt that he had truly _earned_ this compliment. He was beginning to learn how to absorb attacks reflexively, so he could focus on other things. That was the key. Once he mastered that, he could work on escaping, or shoving the flames outward to knock down attackers without letting down his guard.

"Yes. It works well with your nature." Iroh gestured, and Zuko sat cross-legged opposite him at the fire.

"My nature?"

"You have never been destructive, which is the aspect of our element the Fire Nation has focused on for too long. Fire can also protect and create; it is the center of the hearth and the forge." Iroh nodded toward the heating kettle. "Remember the four elements. You have drive and will, the keys of fire. You have become persistent and strong, the marks of earth. Now you need to learn to the lessons from water: adapt, master defense and using it as an offense."

Zuko poured them both tea, using the ritual to hide his unease. He wondered if Iroh's choice of techniques was based more on keeping him safe than honing him so he could defeat Azula. He sighed with lingering guilt over Iroh being hurt in his fight. The end result of rejecting his uncle's wisdom had been disaster. This time, he would try patience.

---

"Move!" Toph shoved Sokka toward Appa and ran after him.

Katara, still in her swimsuit, went the other way to grab her pile of clothes. She snatched the bundle and kept moving as the ground behind her rippled. A maw erupted where her clothes had been the moment before, spraying sand in all directions. Appa hovered over Katara as Aang dropped next to her. Aang shoved her skyward with a burst of air to be caught by Sokka. He leapt to join them, staring down at the giant creature. "What _is_ that thing?"

"It's got to be a quiyin. I thought it was just legend!" Toph rubbed her palms on her thighs nervously. "They're huge. Are you sure we're out of range?"

Sokka flicked one of his failed carvings over the edge and watched it hit several seconds later. The quiyin pulled back into the ground and surged after it. "Pretty sure."

"The vial!" Katara panicked, shaking out the armful of clothes. "We have to go back. That thing ate my vial of oasis water!"

"We can't- hey!" Toph lurched as Appa turned back at Aang's direction. "You're not seriously planning on going down there after bottled water, are you?"

"I can't get it back from up here. This is _your_ area of expertise, Toph! Help would be appreciated!"

"It moves through _rock_ and hunts by vibration. I can't stop it with _sand_, and I'd be ringing the dinner bell the first time I tried." Toph snapped, but dropped back onto the beach alongside Katara anyway.

Aang handed the reigns to Sokka. "Your turn to drive." He dove off, flipping his glider open. He flipped it shut several feet above the sand and landed hard, drawing attention away from the girls long enough to give them time to plan.

"What's the plan?" Katara kept her voice low so the surf masked the noise.

"_Mine_ was to get the hell out of here, but that just didn't work for you, did it princess?"

Katara counted until she didn't want to hold Toph's head underwater. She blinked at a sudden revelation. "Wait. Can that thing swim?"

Toph winced as Aang did another hard landing just ahead of the quiyin. He had no idea how far those creatures could stretch out of the ground. "I don't think so. You want to drown it?"

"Or make it throw my stuff up. Whatever comes first."

Toph took a couple steps back and clenched her fist, compressing sand into rock and shot it straight into the side of the quiyin. The figure under the sand arced and raced back to the source of the blow. With a kick at the last minute, Toph slid out of the way as it shot to the surface.

Katara blasted the quiyin with salt water straight into its cavernous mouth. She made a fist and _pulled_ it back, reversing the direction of the water to jerk it out, with the vial carefully suspended in the center. More confused than hurt, the quiyin wavered a moment, then burrowed beneath the surface, retreating to more familiar territory.

"Very nice." Sokka leaned over Appa's shoulder to stare down at the trio. "Now that we fought off another crazy monster, you realize that Fire Nation soldiers are due to show up. Can't we just go to Ba Sing Se like we planned?"

"Yeah."

"Yep."

"Good call."

---

Zuko sat in his meditative pose, going back over the day's lessons. Something had been so right about concentrating on controlling outside attacks instead of trying to strike first and hardest. If he took this course Iroh planned, he could not only defend himself, he could defend others from Azula too.

Zuko raised a hand from his lap and leaned forward, tracing the symbols of Water and Fire in the dirt. He placed his palm over it, and concentrated on his breathing. In and out. Give and take. Opposite sides of the same coin. His palm glowed with effort, and he continued the exercise with dreamlike calm. Minutes later he removed his hand, and picked up the thin glass disk, examining the designs etched into it.

Zuko dropped the pendant into his pocket, stretched out by the fire and went to sleep.


	2. Author's Notes

**Author's Notes**

This one-shot was done for littlefool in avatarficathon, in response to the following prompt:

**Story Request:**

_General, short prompt (some keywords):_ a necklace, a beach, a dog  
_Genre preferred, provide 3 choices (romance, angst, etc.):_ romance, comedy, or a little bit of angst  
_Ships preferred (at least 3):_ Zuko/Katara, Aang/Toph, Sokka/Katara  
_Rating preferred (G-NC17):_ Anything  
_Absolute No-Nos (sex, fluff, rape, etc.):_ Not a lot of angst, please.

It was intended to be a fun little story that didn't actually affect the main story arc at all. I wrote it with the intention of making it feel like an episode that was cut because it didn't advance the overall plot. The title I took from the calypso song by the Islands.

**Lyrics: **

Woke up with rain on my head  
Can't dry off so what should I do instead?  
Swim to the biggest flower there  
Pick one for you and kiss you, my love

So when the storm clouds dissolved into thin air  
Like when my hands got lost in your thick hair  
The dogs barked long days, not dark  
The sky's blue so what should we do?

We can do anything we want to  
Millions of sunsets, but the one I'll remember  
The one where you told me you'd love me forever  
Took a long walk into the woods

Climbed in the world's biggest tree  
And then they tried to cut it down  
But we didn't make a sound  
The sun blinded them  
They couldn't see

Woke up next to you in your bed  
Another day to do it all again  
Creeped out into the sun  
Another day to give you all my love

Millions of sunsets but the one I'll remember  
Millions of sunsets but the one I'll remember  
Millions of sunsets but the one I'll remember  
Is the one where you told me you'd love me forever

MP3 Download: uploading dot com, file P7460W4I


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